Hi, Without discussing whether adding "generalized soft dependencies" would be a good idea or not, let me give you my two cents about the syntax.
Quoting Eugene V. Lyubimkin (2013-05-08 20:51:54) > Soft-Depends: a {90%}, b (>= 1.2) {20%}, c (>= 4) {99%}, c (>= 6) {70%} > Soft-Depends: iceweasel {50%,tag:desktop}, curl {95%,if_not_installed:wget} > Soft-Depends: debdelta {10%,text:"to enable automatic delta downloading"} We (myself+wookey) recently proposed a new syntax to tag build dependencies with build profiles for bootstrapping [1] but it was deemed not to be a good idea to introduce a new meta character. Instead, it seems that your proposal can easily be implemented using the unified qualifier proposal that was made by Ian Jackson in the same thread [2] which does not spend an additional meta character but extends the architecture qualification syntax: Soft-Depends: a [minthresh:90], b (>= 1.2) [minthresh:20], c (>= 4) [minthresh:99], c (>= 6) [minthresh:70] Soft-Depends: iceweasel [minthresh:50 tag:desktop], curl [minthresh:95 !installed:wget] I also started a thread to discuss Ian Jackson's proposal on d-dpkg@l.d.o [3] where Raphael Hertzog gave a use case [4] for this syntax similar to the one which you address here. cheers, josch [1] http://lists.debian.org/20130115181840.GA16417@hoothoot [2] http://lists.debian.org/20726.45081.38709.233...@chiark.greenend.org.uk [3] http://lists.debian.org/20130419194252.17205.76995@hoothoot [4] http://lists.debian.org/20130421194955.gb2...@x230-buxy.home.ouaza.com -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-devel-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/20130509070158.18633.47628@hoothoot